Welcome to Karnov Group Q4 Report 2022. For the first part of the conference call, the participants will be in listen-only mode. During the questions and answer session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing star 5 on their telephone keypad. I will hand the conference over to the speaker, CEO Pontus Bodelsson, and interim CFO Leif Mårtensson. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Welcome, everyone, to Karnov Group's earnings conference, where we will present the outcome of the fourth 1/4 and the full year 2022. Please go to Slide 2. I am Pontus Bodelsson, President and CEO of the company.
With me, I have our Interim CFO, Leif Mårtensson, and our Head of Investor Relations, Erik Berggren. Leif and I will present the outcome of the 1/4 and year using a few Slides, and then we'll open up for questions.
With that said, let's get started with the presentation. Please go to Slide 3. We are satisfied to have completed our first large European acquisition in the fourth 1/4 as we welcome Region South to the Karnov family on the 13th of November. Karnov Group is now a European player with strong offerings in the Nordics, Spain, France, and Portugal. During the first. Sorry.
During the fourth 1/4, the organic growth was 10%, and organic growth during 2022 was 9%. This is thanks to a strong sales development on all our markets as we capture market opportunities following an increased demand for our services.
Online sales continue to grow, and in the fourth 1/4, offline sales also had a positive development. We are satisfied with the organic growth in the 1/4 and full year. Net sales grew by 67% and amounted to SEK 368 million in the fourth 1/4.
This was mainly due to acquired growth coming from Region South. Excluding Region South, net sales grew by 15%. The adjusted EBITDA margin in Region North, comprising Denmark and Sweden/Norway, 33%, and Karnov Group's margin was 25% in the fourth 1/4.
The Nordic margin is in line with the previous year in the fourth 1/4, while the group margin is diluted due to the acquisition of Region South. We are satisfied with the margin in the Nordics, which proves our earnings capabilities also while preparing for the European expansion. Thanks to a strong operating cash flow, our leverage was at 3.6x EBITDA last twelve months at the end of the year.
Let's move over to Slide 4. Karnov Group has become a strong European player in 2022 following the acquisition of Region South. This provides exciting opportunities within the group onwards. We see possibilities of Cross-Selling products between the local markets and also share products between Region North and Region South. Region North, which consists of Denmark and Sweden/Norway, continued to perform well in the fourth 1/4.
Sales drivers were similar to recent quarters, the public sector, municipalities, and EHS. Last month, we strengthened our EHS offering with a small acquisition in Denmark, which I will present more in detail on a coming Slide. Region South, which consists of our newly acquired businesses in France, Spain, and Portugal, is currently being integrated into Karnov Group.
Our focus for the coming period is to ensure continued focus on customer centricity while simultaneously initiate projects to harvest our intended cost synergies. Please go to Slide number 5. I will now comment a little on our segment, starting first with Denmark. We deliver stable growth in Denmark. The organic growth was 6.0%, and the adjusted EBITDA margin was 27.5% in the fourth 1/4. Leif will comment on the margin later.
Our municipality solution has been well received in the market since the launch during the autumn 2021. In the fourth 1/4, we have continued onboarding additional municipalities. Customer satisfaction is high, and the customers appreciate the combination of broad content and practical guidance. In January this year, we supplemented our EHS portfolio with the acquisition of Nørskov Miljø.
Karnov has thereby become the largest EHS provider also in Denmark. It is a small acquisition and has now been integrated with Notisum Denmark to create an even stronger customer offering. Nørskov Miljø is a provider of a software and service platform for EHS legal compliance and chemical compliance. Net sales in 2022 was DKK 6.4 million with solid profitability. We continuously add value to our legal platform.
In the fourth 1/4, we have incorporated the content from the public Domsdatabasen on our legal platform to the benefit of our customers. Turning the page to Slide 6. In Sweden/Norway, we ended the year on a strong note. Organic growth was 14.1%, and the adjusted EBITDA margin was at the high level of 36.8%. The growth in Sweden is due to our growing online business.
We are able to sell more licenses to our existing customers and attract new customers. We see a trend with a broader customer group now using our services. The new initiative, Rättsområdesanalyser, has now started selling as an Add-On feature on the JUNO platform. Customers are satisfied with this new product, which fits well into the workflow of lawyers. In the fourth 1/4, we also have a minor positive impact from school publications. Turning the page to Slide 7.
Region South became part of the Karnov family on the 30th of November. Net sales and adjusted EBITDA in December were in line with expectations. With this acquisition, we capture an attractive opportunity to create best-in-class offerings on the local markets with strong market positions.
Further, some of the most innovative brands in the European legal information service market will come under one umbrella, creating a strong basis for new legal tech solutions. We initiated the integration in connection with closing and all progress in line with the work plan. We are currently preparing a common product portfolio in Spain, utilizing the best of both businesses while preparing having only one platform in Region South, including also our French business.
Our intention is to harvest synergies of EUR 7.5 million with full effect at the end of 2024, and synergies of a total of EUR 10 million with full effect at the end of 2026. Costs to achieve these synergies are estimated to amount to EUR 24 million. Please go to Slide number 8. 2022 was a year marked by a turbulent global environment that began with Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with macroeconomic and geopolitical changes as a consequence.
Combined with high inflation and gradually rising interest rates, this has put pressure on financial markets. Of course, business is also affected, and for Karnov, this is testing our resilience. It is therefore with the utmost humbleness that I note that we have built a solid business model that has remained unaffected by economic fluctuations and continues to evolve and deliver value to our customers.
We will continue to add value, developing new solutions to make our users more efficient. It is all about understanding our customers' challenges of today and opportunities of tomorrow. We will also continue having our eyes open for additional M&A activities in Europe to bring more value to customers and to shareholders. Please go to Slide number 9. I will now hand over the floor to our Interim CFO, Leif Mårtensson, who will tell us more about the financial results in the fourth 1/4 and the full year.
Thank you, Pontus. glad to be here talking to you guys today. Let's turn to page 10. Looking at our sales development during 2022, as you know, due to the acquisitions but also due to very strong organic growth during 2022, we are on a growth journey.
We actually reached a milestone in what we could call old Karnov, or as I will call it in this presentation, Region North, of just shy of 1 billion SEK. If we include the acquired business, we're actually quite well over 1 billion SEK. We had a very strong 1/4 four, ended the year in a very good way with a 10% organic growth in North. That.
On top of that was added a currency effect of 5% due to the weakness of the Swedish krona. The Q4, including South, was SEK 368 million. That's quite a substantial growth on our total sales. I must also add that South is coming in according to expectations and very close to what we have seen through the year until we managed to finalize the acquisition and close it by the end of November.
Turning to the next page, we also had a very similar and strong development on our margins, with SEK 83 million margin in North, 32.5%. We have to add to that 32.5% that we are taking some SEK 7 million extra costs similar to what we did in Q3.
The actual underlying operating margin is 35.4% in the business, whereas SEK 7 million is a preparation for the fact that the group is actually becoming twice as large as of the 1st of December or 30th of November. We are continuing on a very strong trajectory with protecting our margins. If we look at the full year, presenting SEK 354 million, SEK margin, 35.4%. If we add back the extra cost, we're actually spot on the 37% we had last year.
Taking the good Top-Line growth into consideration, we are a lot stronger coming out of 2022 than we were out of 2021. Of course, I will come back a little bit more to the development, including South.
As you can see, South is only marginally adding to our margin, of course, due to the fact that it's only one month of development. We turn to page 12 and look at the quarterly development, we can conclude that sales is growing 1/4 by 1/4 in a very strong way. Not really any sort of downfalls in the development. Of course, as you can see, we have Made South light blue here so you can actually see the development in the underlying business in the North. Turning to page 13, same story goes for the earnings.
We have very stable adjusted EBITA margin and also adding back the extra cost that we've taken on in Q3 and Q4, you can see that the trajectory is actually really good, and we're continuing to make good money on the underlying business.
In spite of the fact that we had a really good spike in Q3 from offline sales in Sweden with slightly lower margin, but still adding to the totality. Moving on to Slide 14. If we look at our online sales, as you can see, we're growing really well on the online sales, we're keeping our ratio between online and offline in a good way.
We did have an extra spike of offline, as I just mentioned, particularly in Q3, but we are on a very good trajectory on our online sales, and that is the basis for the underlying growth in Region North. Region South will have a slight detrimental effect on the online, due to the fact that they have a lower percentage of online, in their business, which also actually gives us a great opportunity to increase profitability and growth in
Region South with the experiences we have in Region North. So, we're actually on a good trajectory on that one as well. Moving on to page 15. If we look at the subscriptions, same story as with offline. We're increasing the pro rata subscriptions in a very positive way.
In this case, we will not have any negative effects from South because they have basically the same patterns as we have in Region North when it comes to subscriptions, which is very positive. It's easier to add on products and services to existing customer base with existing contracts. Getting a little bit more into the details, moving on to page 16.
If we look at Denmark, what meets the eye is, of course, that Denmark looks as we are not getting into good territory, but I must remind you that all the extra cost for group activities that we've taken on during 2022 has actually been in Denmark. If you look at the margin in Q4 of 28%, it's actually 33% when we add back to group cost.
If we look at it on a full year, it's 37.6%, which means that they are still on a very good margin. On top of that, we have a 6% organic growth in sales in Denmark. It's definitely not a burning platform. It's a part of the business that is continuously growing, and it's growing with good profitability.
What also spikes the numbers on sales is, of course, that we've had a 9% currency effect in Q4, again, due to the Swedish krona being slightly weaker towards the Euro and the Danish krona. Turning to page 17, looking at Sweden, extremely good development on sales plus 14% in Q4, which is not so different from the full year, which is actually plus 13%.
The margins on 37%, both in Q4 and full year, in spite, also, on top that we have, quite high offline sales this year due to the school curricula in Q3, which spilled over a little bit into Q4 as well. We have good development across the board.
Municipalities are signing up, and we're doing really well on the EHS side as well. It's a really strong underlying development in Sweden, Norway. If we then turn to page 18, which is a new page, and we're happily welcoming the guys from France, Spain and Portugal into the family. They have contributed with sales of SEK 114 million in December, i.e.
Q4, a SEK 10 million EBITDA margin, which constitutes a 9% margin, profitability margin on South, which is in line with the expectations. As you have seen in our previous numbers, there is a difference in profitability in the newly acquired and the old Karnov, which will, of course, have a dilutive effect on the totality for the business.
If we look at the synergies, we are confirming that we are still looking for the EUR 7.5 million synergies by the end of 2024 and an additional EUR 2.5 million in the end of 2026. We have so far not seen anything that will dilute those synergies.
On the contrary, we will most likely be able to deliver more synergies now that we gradually know more and more about the business. From just also on a different note, from Q1, we will report Region North, Region South and a group function separately.
Including full LTM numbers, so you will be able to follow the development of this business in an organic way as well. Turning to page 19. Good cash flow 261, which is actually 47 higher than last year. We're ending the year with a good cash pile of SEK 671 million. We came in at the leverage of 3.6, which was slightly lower than what we expected, just so close after the closing of the deal.
We will be able to improve on that leverage as we go along through the year. The high leverage, 3.6, is still pretty high for a company of our structure. That has led the board to recommend the AGM that there will be no dividends, so we can further strengthen our leverage during the year. Thank you, guys. Handing back over to Pontus.
Thank you very much, Leif. Please switch to Slide 20. I just want to conclude this presentation by presenting a summary of the highlights of Q4 in 2022. It has been a transformative year for Karnov Group with the acquisition of Region South as a highlight at the end of November. We are satisfied with an organic growth of 9.2% and adjusted EBITDA margin of 32.7% during 2022. Karnov Group has grown in both Denmark and Sweden, Norway during 2022.
We see a strong demand for our services and look forward to continuing strengthening our offering to cement our position as market leaders in the Nordics. France, Spain, and Portugal are our new home markets. We look forward to integrating the local businesses and to get stronger offerings to the benefit of our customers. Please switch to Slide 21.
By this, I'll end our presentation. We are now ready to take questions. I'll hand over the conference again to our host.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please dial star 5 on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial star 5 again on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Daniel Ovin from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Oving, Pontus, and Leif, thank you for taking my questions. The first question is on the very strong organic sales growth in the Swedish and Norway segment, despite now meeting quite a tough comparison. You mentioned here in municipalities, EHS, also school publication. Perhaps you can shed some more light if this was the main driver here, and also if there is some Non-Recurring nature also in Q4. Perhaps you can quantify if that is the case. That's the first question. Thank you.
Yes, you're totally right. It's the public sector municipalities and the EHS vertical that drives it, so it's mostly online products. On top of that, as you mentioned, is still the school publications. It's something that we saw in Q3, and there's still some sales on those products during Q4, which is positive but a bit surprising. Going forward, I would say that it's not to be expected to have those extraordinary offline sales in Q3 and 4 next year. That's the sort of the forecast regarding those offline products.
It's not in the same range as in Q3 you mentioned. I mean, is it supported by a few percentage points now, or is it still a big support from these school publications in Q4?
It's much less in Q4 than in Q3.
Okay. Okay. Great. All right. Then, also I have a question on the Danish segment and the 7 million SEK in cost for incorporating Region South. How should we think about this going forward? Should it be roughly at this level or perhaps even come up further from these levels going forward? Perhaps you can shed some light on that. That's the second question. Thank you.
It's actually going to come down a little bit going forward because we've had a sort of built up where we had to get assistance from consultants on top of hiring people that will constitute the group function. They will actually come down. It's not a permanent story. We had to make these changes ahead of the closing of the acquisition of South. It will come down slightly, but there will be some remains left. All the consultancy fees will come out.
Okay. Great. Thank you. Then lastly, just a question on the South Group. Now it's only 1 month here that, we have the number for, but I mean, if you just do, kind of annualize that number, and if you look at the margin and the kind of EBITDA that would suggest, it seems a bit lower than the numbers that you gave. When you did the acquisition, I think that was like, SEK 170 Million-SEK 180 million in EBITDA, and now you're doing SEK 10 million in a month. I think at that time, the adjusted EBITDA margin looked to be around 13%-14%, and now it's around 9%.
I don't know if there's seasonality here or if there's some one-off factors, or has it actually been a slowdown in the those assets since the acquisition? Perhaps you can just share some light on that. That's the last question. Thank you.
Absolutely. It's actually the difference between EBITDA and EBITA. The EBITDA margin is actually still on the, on the expected level. In the report now to be consistent with our other reporting, we report EBITA. We're looking at an EBITA on the level that was expected, and the EBITDA comes in also on the level expected.
There has been no major changes or no changes, I would say. Actually, South came out pretty good on both top line and margin and as expected. This level of profitability on the EBITA level is actually what was, but we communicated EBITDA previously.
Okay, I understand. All right. Thank you very much for taking my questions. Thank you.
The next question comes from Predrag Savinovic from Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much, operator. Good morning, Erik, Pontus, and Leif. I'd like to start with, you know, a strategic maybe a question on Region South. If you could compare or take a step back and compare your position there relative to what you have in the Nordics.
What I'm particularly interested in is your annotations that you built up in the Nordic region, which is quite important for the value of the platform. If you can tie that into your commentary on Nordics versus Region South, and if you have any plans on how to take these closer to one another in the coming years.
Thank you. It's an important question, of course. What we see in the South is, I'd say a starting point. As a starting point, for this reasoning is that, our mission and our products are very similar, meaning that the product having database, and commentaries, and preparatory work, et cetera, et cetera, gathered in one legal information solutions.
That's about the same, both in Denmark, Sweden, and for the countries and the markets in the South. There's no big difference there. The products are produced in the same way, meaning that we do have, experts, authors, that's, really, a valuable partner for our company. There's no big differences in that context.
We could say that in the 2 companies in Spain, LA LEY and Aranzadi, there's of course differences and different strengths. In Aranzadi, they have a premium product called Aranzadi Digital, which is the product for lawyers in Spain.
That's of course, if you compare to Denmark, it's a kind of online, which bears the same premium taste, so to say. Comparing with the LA LEY, who's really strong among the public sector and small and solo law firms. Slightly different flavor to those products. In France, they're very strong when it comes to labor law. They're actually the market leader in terms of labor law with the product Liaisons Sociales.
Yes, the foundation for the products is more or less the same, built upon experts, long relationships with the very best experts and authors in the different markets, and then working closely together with them, forming the information.
We are able to add the value, and as we say in the Nordics, goes also from the South, making better decisions faster. That's why we exist. The markets are a bit more scattered in the South compared to the North. We are, as you know, market leaders in Sweden and Denmark. We are from now on, also in Spain, combining the 2, LA LEY and Aranzadi. In France, we are number 3. That's about how the markets are structured.
Okay. Thank you, Pontus. I think that's quite encouraging. Can you, on the cash flow, on not particularly for this 1/4, but for 2023 and onward, if you can give some flavor on what we should expect relative to sales or EBITDA on a pro forma level now, because there's a lot happening, of course, when these ones, I mean, come into the book, so to speak?
If we comment slightly on the cash flow, I mean the structure of the businesses is quite similar. The drop through of EBITDA into cash is quite similar from a structural point of view. We see a strong cash flow going forward as well. On the other side of the coin, of course, is the fact that we are gonna obtain some synergies that will give us some extra costs.
We will also invest in our IT systems that will keep CapEx on a similar level as in the past going forward. We will continue to be a strong cash generator, and we will be able also to decrease our leverage, as I mentioned earlier, in a positive way.
Okay. Another thing Leif you mentioned is, and this might be early days, but it sounds as if you had a few first positive impressions from the consolidation. I think you mentioned you might see more synergies, for example. Why, why is that? What have you seen that could make you potentially even upgrade this synergy target?
you can take that one, Pontus.
Yeah. I'd say that your comment, Leif, is I'd say especially relevant in terms of timing, because as Leif said, we hope to reap the benefits of EUR 7.5 million at the end of 2024. We have already seen few and small, good promising things. Like we have a combination of content in Spain, where we buy databases now not only to 2 companies, but to the total entity in Spain. We are beginning to see the cost efficiencies already now, but the big chunk, of course, will be not until the end of 2024.
Okay, super. Just a final one. You said you were eyeing the market for other acquisitions. Is this, I mean, now in the near term, I'm thinking you have quite a backlog of integration work, and you've commented on your leverage, or is that more to tell us, you know, after we've come through some of the integration, we'll add more acquisitions as well?
Well, this is, of course, a big bite for us, so let's be humble. We will have to focus on the integration for some time. Even having said that, we do have a good list of potential candidates, of course, for M&A. As Leif said, we will try to be prepared from a financial point of view, and we'll try to get also prepared from a management point of view. Again, it's a big bite. We are working hard to integrate these companies into Karnov. We are on a growth track, so we'll see in the time to come.